


[STATIC]

by schrodingers__cat



Category: Little Nightmares (Video Game)
Genre: Backstory, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, I just want mono and six to be FRIENDS but canon won’t cooperate, Implied time loop, ambiguous interpretation, goes in-depth on mono’s relationship to the tower and the flesh thing, no beta we die like runaway kid, poor mono’s in a lot of pain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-24 03:40:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30066111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/schrodingers__cat/pseuds/schrodingers__cat
Summary: He rummages through garbage bins and old abandoned houses, but nothing he finds suits him so well as the paper bag does. He cuts holes in it for his eyes and places it over his head, and—And he feels safe. Cold, and lonely, but safe.
Relationships: Mono & Six (Little Nightmares), Mono & The Signal Tower (Little Nightmares), Mono & The Thin Man (Little Nightmares)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 87





	[STATIC]

He was too young when it happened to remember when the city twisted. 

It’s all he knows. 

But the older kids all call it the worst day of their lives—which is saying something when you live in the Pale City. Mono knows that better than anyone. 

——————

There’s a television in the ruins of a building, old and half-dead but still glowing with the harsh, pale blue light of the Tower. 

Mono stares at it, curious. 

[On a day he can’t remember he is sitting on a chair and kicking his legs, he’s bored, the waiting room of the broadcasting tower doesn’t have any toys but they said he can’t come downstairs, they’re too busy, he has to wait.]

His head hurts.

[Something is twisting twisting twisting TWISTING and RISING and BLINKING and SCREAMING and his HEAD HURTS]

He turns the TV off. 

——————

Why do they hate him? 

All the twisted people see his face and run at him, screeching, clawing. All the terrified children still in their uniforms see him and run, screaming. All of the porcelain children that replaced them scramble to tear him apart, feral like animals. All of the not-quite-people that are still left HATE him. 

There aren’t any mirrors anymore, and he can’t see his reflection in the TV screen. He doesn’t know what’s wrong with him, he doesn’t know why they hate him _they hate him_ why do they hate him—

[The blinking twisting thing rises up from downstairs _where is everyone?_ it’s coming for him it’s coming for him he backs up against the wall and it’s coming for him it’s so close he SCREAMS and it STOPS.]

——————

It gets bad. It gets so bad he decides—

[WHAT ARE YOU, it seethes.]

—If there’s something so wrong with him—

[mono, he says, because there is nothing else to say.]

—Then he’ll just have to tuck it away, bury it, keep it hidden where no one will ever see. 

[THAT IS FITTING, it murmurs. WE WILL ENSURE IT REMAINS SO]

He rummages through garbage bins and old abandoned houses, but nothing he finds suits him so well as the paper bag does. He cuts holes in it for his eyes and places it over his head, and—

And he feels safe. Cold, and lonely, but safe. 

[YOU CANNOT HOLD US FOREVER, BROADCASTER-TOWER-CAGE-VESSEL-MONO]

[you can’t hold me forever, either]

[WE WILL SEE]

——————

He remembers a boy with brown hair and goggles over his eyes named Twenty-Three. 

“That’s a weird name.”

“I picked it,” Twenty-Three says. 

“Why?”

“I like the way the letters sound,” Twenty-Three shrugs. “What’s your name?”

“Mono,” he says, and the syllables come easily to him, like they’ve been there all his life.

“Your name is weirder,” Twenty-Three decides.

“Sure,” Mono says. 

——————

(Twenty-Three doesn’t make it out of the collapse and Mono SCREAMS, but it doesn’t help. The ruined building is still silent and Mono is still alone.)

——————

There’s a girl named Evie on a balcony, and her hair is long and blonde and blood-streaked. 

“It’s what my mum used to call me,” she explains. 

Mono cocks his head, confused. 

“She’s gone now, it doesn’t matter,” Evie shakes her head. “Are you coming?”

Mono nods, without any hesitation. 

“‘Kay. What’s with the bag, by the way?”

“...Makes me feel better.”

“If you say so.”

——————

(Evie ventures into the old boarding school to look for food, leaving Mono to stand guard. She doesn’t come back. When Mono runs in to rescue her, dragging a hammer dusted with porcelain behind him, he can’t find a trace of what they did to her—except for a single lock of long blonde hair snagged on one of the lockers. He bashes in the heads of as many false-children as he can, a desperate attempt to make them feel what she felt, what he’s feeling, but it’s not enough.)

——————

There’s a girl with a long, dark braid over one shoulder, silhouetted against the Tower. She waves at him. He waves back, and then she climbs down the building and she’s gone. 

——————

Jack is timid, and his dark hair is long enough to cover his whole face and then some. 

“I saw it in a lot of fairytale books,” Jack shrugs. “Good enough for me.” He shuffles, awkwardly.

“It’s a nice name,” Mono offers. 

“Thanks.”

“Mhm.”

“Um—“ Jack hesitates. “Could you—um—“ he gestures in the direction of a chain-link fence, with a hole in it too high to reach. 

Mono nods, and boosts Jack up to the hole. He watches him go. 

——————

(Jack doesn’t come back, and there’s nothing left of him at all. He might be dead. He might’ve just ran. Mono will never know—and that, he thinks, is always so much worse.)

——————

There are two children in boarding school uniforms, running, jumping through empty apartments and out windows. At first Mono thinks they’re porcelain, but their hair is starting to grow long over their eyes and whenever Mono tries to approach they back away, slowly, glaring with too-human eyes. The girl is clutching something in her hands. 

They’re desperate, but not desperate enough to let Mono near them. He keeps ahead of them anyway, clears out their path, simplifies the obstacles. It’s the least he can do.

——————

The building is on fire and then it isn’t and he has to run, he has to run. The sprinklers are pouring dark, contaminated water over his clothes and his paper bag, something is coming something is coming the other children aren’t running why aren’t they running why aren’t they coming with him—

_[STATICSTATICSTATIC]_

—He hides in the shell of an old television, ignoring the way the broken glass catches on his bare feet—

[Something is wrong]

—And then it’s gone. The building is empty and quiet and something made hollow. It’s too dark to see and all he can smell is leftover smoke and old, dirty water. Thunder crashes outside, and he flinches without meaning to. 

He doesn’t move for a long time. 

——————

There’s a TV turned on in a living room long-abandoned. 

[BROADCASTER]

[leave me alone]

[TOWER]

[please]

[CAGE]

[get out of my head]

[VESSEL]

[shut up]

[MONO]

“LEAVE ME ALONE,” he cries. He takes a piece of debris and launches it into the screen. It shatters into glass shards, sparking and sputtering, but his head still HURTS. 

(The Tower looms outside.)

He can’t stay here anymore. He can’t. 

——————

His makeshift raft is an old door, rotting on the sand. It takes him away away away away from the Pale City, and the pressure on his head lessens. And lessens. And lessens. And lessens until it is nothing but a quiet murmur and he feels like he can breathe for the first time. 

——————

He finds himself in a forested wilderness, mossy and mostly-peaceful and ever-twilight, with plenty of nuts and berries to eat and only the Hunter to avoid. 

Now all he has to worry about is the quiet.

——————

He settles into a comfortable sort of loneliness that he hates, he hates everything about it, [too quiet too cold too alone i can’t take it] but every time he even considers going back to the Pale City he just—freezes. Can’t make himself do it. Can’t make himself go back to the harsh blue light and Tower (his head doesn’t hurt out here he doesn’t want to hurt anymore) and all the twisted false people that hate him. 

——————

He gives all the shiny rocks and bits of glass he finds to the crows. In return, they warn him when the Hunter is near. It’s not quite friendship, but Mono will take what he can get.

——————

A crow caws, fluttering by Mono, who’s sitting up in a tree. He looks down. 

There’s a little girl in a sweater running through the grass and undergrowth, the blinding yellow light of the Hunter just behind her. She is clutching something to her chest, tightly, like her life depends on it. She crawls through tangled tree roots, and the Hunter lumbers after her, fumbling with his shotgun. 

She sees Mono, and stares. Her hair has grown over her eyes and he can’t see her expression. He can’t warn her in time before the Hunter is upon her, and she is taken away to the cabin, gripped in his fist. 

——————

It takes him a long time to decide to go after her. Too long. He wants to, he really does, but the loneliness is comfortable and he’s become accustomed to the quiet. 

(He’s not scared. He’s not.)

He leaps down from his perch in the trees. He doesn’t come down to the ground much these days, but—

There’s a television on the ground. There’s a TV on the ground in the forest, and he tries not to think much of it, but—

_[STATIC]_

...He won’t be able to live with himself if he doesn’t go after her. And if the Hunter has killed her already, well, that’s Mono’s fault, and he needs to see it. 

——————

He wakes up next to the television and ignores the aching in his head. 

——————

Mono is well-versed in the Hunter’s traps by now and it’s a simple matter to sneak into the cabin, creeping through the hallways and down the stairs until he’s in the basement. 

The sound of a music box filters through a rotting door, and the song is pretty and familiar, in a 

_[STATIC]_

in a way that he just can’t place. 

The only way through the door is with the axe he’s dragging behind him. He winces, but swings it through the half-rotted boards as hard as he can. Then again. Then again. 

The girl scrambles back to hide under a table, music box discarded. 

Mono holds out his hand. 

Please. Please, please please let me help you.

She dashes past him, knocking him into the ground. 

——————

“Hey!” 

Mono startles. The girl beckons him over, gesturing towards the handle to pull down the attic door. Wordlessly, Mono lets her boost him up, and together they open the door. 

They pick their way through the attic and out of the cabin silently, all too aware of the heavy footsteps of the Hunter, until they’re out and they have to run and the sound of the shotgun rings violently in Mono’s ears and he grabs the girl’s hand and drags her to safety. 

——————

_[STATIC]_

The glitching shadow-child rushes into his chest. He wishes he could hear what it said. 

——————

She rips her hand out of his when they reach the burrow. 

“So what’s your name?” he asks. His voice is hoarse with disuse, and quiet by necessity. 

She doesn’t answer. 

“I’m Mono,” he says. 

“...Six,” she mutters. 

“How come?” 

“What do you mean, how come?”

“Well, why’s that your name?”

“Why’s Mono your name?”

...He’s not sure how to answer. “Just felt right.”

“Dumb.”

“So why’re you Six?”

“‘Cause it’s my name. That’s it.”

“Okay,” Mono lets himself sound a little teasing, smiles even though she can’t see it. “If you say so.”

“I do.”

“Good.”

“Good.” She huffs. Mono giggles, and she throws him a glare that could kill every monster in the Pale City. Mono just laughs softly, and starts to guide them both out of the burrow. 

She stares at him for a long moment. “You’re so weird,” she decides. 

“Thanks,” Mono grins.

——————

She holds her hand out over the broken bridge, over the drop. Without even thinking Mono runs and leaps, and she effortlessly catches his hand in her own, and with a bit more effort, manages to drag him to stable ground. 

“Thank you,” Mono says as he tries to get his breath back. Six just shakes her head.

——————

She catches him as the Hunter chases them again. 

“Tha—“

“Shh!” She hisses. 

——————

In the swamp, he reaches for her hand. She rips it away, glaring at him through her bangs. 

“I just wanna make sure we stick close,” he whispers. It’s at least half of the truth, so she relents, lets her hand fall limp, lets him take it in his. 

——————

She almost smiles at him when he pulls the shotgun off the wall. She almost laughs when they shoot the Hunter. Mono smiles at her, bouncing a little with adrenaline and excitement. Six rolls her eyes. 

——————

“Where do you want to go?” he asks, pushing his old door into the lake. 

“Forward,” is all she says. And even though forward is the Pale City... Six is his friend, and they’ll go there together. 

——————

The Pale City looms above them, drooping over the water. (His head hurts, but it’s fine.)

——————

[BROADCASTER-TOWER-CAGE-VESSEL-MONO]

[shut up]

——————

They wander through the ruins of buildings, carefully silent, only whispering when they need to. 

“Hey,” Six waves for him to jump. He leaps, and she easily catches him again. 

——————

She doesn’t say anything about the shadow-children. He wonders if she can see them at all. 

[They’re screaming for him but he can’t hear them he can’t hear them he wishes he could hear them it’s all just _staticstaticstaticstatic—]_

——————

“I’m not gonna run off,” Six whispers. “Why do we still need to hold hands?”

“I want to,” Mono whispers back. “Is that okay?”

“I guess,” she says, and Mono grins at her. She can’t see the expression, but she rolls her eyes anyway, muttering “stupid” under her breath. It only makes Mono grin more. 

——————

The television is on and his head hurts his head hurts his HEAD HURTS why does it NEVER STOP he tries to gasp out _leave me alone_ but it just gets LOUDER—

[BROADCASTER-TOWER-CAGE-VESSEL-MONO]

[not yet] [leave me alone] [it’s not time yet] [please] [shhhh, it’s okay] [it hurts] [i know it does] [it won’t stop] [i’m sorry]

He touches the screen and it collapses around his fingers like water. 

[TUNE]

[not yet]

He reaches through the screen and then he’s running, it’s a familiar nightmare he is running running running running the hallway is twisting and the door at the end is blinking and he knows it—

He is unceremoniously yanked from the transmission by Six, frowning, her hands fluttering around his face like he might be injured and she doesn’t know how to help. He shakes his head. She doesn’t say anything, just helps him stand, and for that he is grateful. He squeezes her hand.

She squeezes back. 

——————

The old boarding school is large and ominous before them. Mono ignores it completely, because there’s a playground. 

He sits on one end of the seesaw. Six watches him curiously. He gestures for her to get on.

She stands right in front of him.

“Not like that,” he points at the other end of the seesaw. “Sit over there.” 

She cocks her head. 

“Sit on the other end of the seesaw! Like I’m doing!” 

She doesn’t move. Mono gets the feeling he’s being mocked. 

“Ugh, fine,” he sticks his tongue out at her, remembering too late she can’t see it. He goes over to the goal, and stands in front of it. 

“Betcha can’t get past me,” he taunts. 

Six walks calmly over to the ball. She kicks it, hard, and it soars over the playground—to smack Mono in the head.

“Guess I cant,” she shrugs. 

“Ow,” Mono dramatically falls backward. “Oh, ow, my head. I’m dying, Six. You killed me.”

“Oops,” she says, completely deadpan. 

Mono sits up, giggling. “Wanna try the swings?”

“We gotta go,” Six shakes her head. 

“Alright.”

——————

Mono hates the school. Hates the traps and the scrabbling porcelain children and the Teacher and the lockers and the chalk and the _everything_ about it. But Mono hates a lot of things, and the school isn’t very special. 

But when the porcelain bullies take Six away, he’s never hated anything more. He sends his hammer careening into their stupid, stupid heads and he hopes it hurts. 

(Please be okay please be okay please be okay please be okay please—)

The Teacher’s wide-eyed, bloodshot gaze isn’t enough to deter him, and neither is her neck extending farther and farther and farther and farther just to snatch him up in her unhinged jaws. He keeps going. Forward, always forward. 

——————

The porcelain child tied to the chalkboard is drawing a twisting blinking thing that Mono doesn’t want to look at. He puts the thing out of its misery. 

——————

He takes off his bag to put the head of a porcelain child on, and he rarely feels this terrified. He’s never felt more exposed. Broken open and bare. 

He moves forward.

——————

His hands are coated with porcelain dust. His feet are scratched and scraped from stepping on the shards. He growls under his breath and smashes in another false-child’s head. 

——————

They’re keeping her in the bathroom. He launches himself at the porcelain children, easily shattering them, and then, frantically, almost panicky, he lets her down. It’s not a gentle fall, and he rushes over to her. 

(She’s not moving she’s not moving—)

“Hey,” he whispers, reaching for her hand. The relief he feels when she blinks her eyes open is crushing. 

He helps her stand, and she’s wobbly but she’s okay. She’s okay. He got there in time. 

She’s okay. 

——————

“Why would you do that,” Six asks as they walk, and her voice is so quiet Mono can barely hear it. 

“Why wouldn’t I?” The question is genuine, but Six looks doubtful. 

“I got caught. I’m dead weight.” 

“You’re my friend. Friends are never dead weight.” 

“Anyone can be dead weight.”

“Not you.”

“Especially me.” 

Mono whips around to face her. “I’ll always come back for you,” he says. “I promise.”

“Don’t lie to me,” she scoffs, but she doesn’t pull away when he takes her hand. He pretends he doesn’t notice how her hands are shaking. 

——————

He dances around on the piano, giggling at the discordant sounds. 

“I’m writing a song for you!” he exclaims when Six tries to pull him off of the keys. 

“Write a better one,” Six snorts. 

“Not all of us can be musically talented, Six.”

“I’m not musically talented.” 

“Yes you are,” Mono tilts his head. “I’ve heard you sing. It’s really good.”

Six gapes at him. “No. No it’s not. Now shut up and jump.” 

“It’s always really pretty, I dunno why you think—“

“Shut!”

——————

There’s a porcelain child in the corner of the room, and Mono picks up his hammer but with a low, nearly-silent growl, Six launches herself at it. She grips its neck and slams its head into the floor, shattering it. 

Mono stares. 

She stands up and glares at him, like she’s daring him to do something. (To judge her. Abandon her. Call her a monster.)

He sets down his hammer and starts to climb over the barricade blocking their path. When she thinks he isn’t looking, she sags with some kind of relief. 

(Mono knows what it’s like to be called a monster.)

——————

It’s raining when they escape the school, the sounds of screaming false-children and twisted Teachers fading behind them. 

It’s freezing, miserable, slippery, and ridiculously hard to see. But the sound is nice, and the pale blue light of the city reflects off of the puddles in bright, abstract shapes. Mono stomps in one, and laughs at the splash it makes, even as his toes are numb with cold and his cut-up feet protest at the abuse. 

He looks back at Six, and his heart drops. She’s huddled in her sweater, shivering and coughing. Mono can’t help rushing to her side. 

“You okay?”

“It’s fine.”

“You can have my coat if you want it—“

“I said it’s fine!” But the fury of her statement is rather undercut by a high-pitched sneeze.

Mono takes her hand. “C’mon, lets find somewhere that’s dry.”

——————

There’s a discarded raincoat in an old storage room. Six slides it on, and when she pulls the hood over her head, she seems to... straighten. To look more like herself. 

“Do you like it?” Mono asks.

She nods.

——————

They sneak into what used to be some kind of tailor’s shop. Mono blinks slowly as they finally, finally stop running, and the warm, stale air of the shop rushes over him. 

“Okay,” he says. “Sleep.”

“We can’t,” Six protests, even as she stumbles. 

“We have to,” Mono insists. 

“There’s no time—“

“There is. Just for a little bit. Please?” 

“...Okay,” she sighs. “Okay. 

Mono smiles at her. He thinks she can tell, even if she can’t see it. 

They fall asleep behind the counter, to the darkness of the shop and the pattering of the rain and Six’s soft humming. 

And when Mono wakes up gasping for breath, she’s curled up right beside him. He presses his head against her shoulder, and breathes. 

——————

They don’t realize they’re in a hospital until they see the bandages, sitting innocently on a cart.

“Are you sure this is the only way?” Six glances around the dimly-lit hallway. 

“Every other path collapsed,” Mono shrugs. “This is all that’s left.”

“Well that’s stupid.”

“I know,” Mono laughs, but it’s hollow.

——————

She catches him again after he nearly careens off the edge of a gaping, bed-filled cavern. His terrified gasp echoes loudly.

“Clumsy,” she snorts. He just smiles sheepishly as he shakily stands back up on solid ground. 

——————

There’s a TV on why is the TV on why is it so BRIGHT ITS SO BRIGHT AND IT HURTSHURTSHURTS _HURTS—_

[BROADCASTER-TOWER-CAGE-VESSEL-MONO]

[not yet] [why won’t you go away] [it’ll be alright] [let go of me] [i can’t do that] [let go of me] [i can’t] [it hurts so badly] [it’ll be over soon] 

The screen ripples where his hand presses against it. 

[TUNE]

[not yet]

And then he is running, the door is so much closer this time it twists and blinks and he reaches forward and—

—And Six drags him out of the transmission again. He reaches for her hand, trembling, breathing heavily, and she lets him shake, lets his head hurt for a bit, before she pulls him up. 

She raises an eyebrow. _You okay?_

He nods. _Just fine._

They move on.

——————

Six tends to refuse to let herself be happy until she’s sure that it will be permanent, but Mono likes to hold tightly onto every little bit of happiness that he can, keep it close and protect like it’s his own little candle flame in the wind and rain. 

And—and Six really likes the X-Ray machine, and Mono wants to holds onto that as tightly as he can.

She runs to it, waving at him, laughing silently knowing that Mono is seeing nothing but her skeleton. He waves back, giggling, and runs to join her, taking her hand. They both wave their arms wildly, laughing. 

He picks up a teddy bear, and puppets it around. He pokes her nose with its stuffed paw, and she swats it away, picking up a wooden duck and hugging it close to her chest. 

They mess around for as long as they can, but eventually Mono finds the key, and they have to go forward. 

——————

He’s separate from Six so much in the hospital, and he hates it. He’s nervous every time he leaves her behind. 

(He never had this much trouble being alone before, he always hated it but it was easy and it was comfortable. What changed—why did Six change it?)

The not-quite-people don’t help. He falls back on old habits of absolute silence, shining his new flashlight at every shadow, desperate to keep it all still and unmoving. He’s not that lucky, of course, and the clacking of prosthetic fingers is going to haunt his nightmares. He’s sure of it. 

“Hey!” Six whispers as she opens the barred door for him, which beeps loudly and harshly in the silence. 

“Never again,” he barrels towards her. “No, no, no, no, and hey, also no.” 

She raises an eyebrow at him as he waves his flashlight around. 

“Oooookay.”

——————

“See! That! No!” Mono slams his length of pipe into the skittering, clawing hand, and groans when a second one shows up. “No!”

“Complain later, kill it now!” Six hisses as she pulls desperately on the boards blocking their exit. 

“I’m trying!”

——————

The Doctor is huge and lumbering and terrifyingly quick for all its weight, crawling around on the ceiling like some kind of misshapen bug.

“Gross,” Six whispers, and despite all his terror, Mono almost laughs. 

——————

He doesn’t even hesitate to pull the incinerator lever. The Doctor screams and thrashes as it burns, but Mono is just relieved. 

Six sits down and warms her hands by the fire, still spitting out the ashes of the Doctor. He gives her a look. She just shrugs. 

“Do you think he deserved it?” He asks her later.

“Does it matter? We lived, he died. That’s how it goes.” 

——————

It’s still pouring rain outside, and they rush to get to the next open building. 

A twisted man with a vacant face charges into the TV screen. Mono is just glad that the TV is broken, and Six kicks the body as they pass it by.

——————

The Tower looms. Six stares at it curiously, and Mono takes her hand and pulls her forward, silently urging her to move on. 

He sends her to the next rooftop on a makeshift zip line, and even in the rain, she easily catches him when he jumps to her. 

——————

The building starts to crumble and Mono’s heart drops, he grabs Six’s hand and starts sprinting, they have to get out they have to get out or they’ll be buried alive—

Six’s hand is torn from his and he hears her gasp as the ceiling falls in and he jumps. 

_[STATIC]_

——————

He blinks his eyes open slowly, painfully, curling in on himself. He lifts the board off of his legs and tries to clear the—the— _[STATIC]_ —tries to clear his head. 

Where’s Six?

Where is she? 

He frantically stands, stumbling and nearly falling sideways until he sees the bright yellow of her raincoat in the fallen rubble. 

“Hey,” he whispers, like they always do, “hey, hey, hey, I’ve got you.” He grabs her arms and pulls, and they tumble to the ground.

He looks up at her from the floor, and smiles when she blinks at him. He might be imagining it, but he thinks she smiles back. 

(He grabs her hand when they leave, and he won’t be letting go anytime soon. She squeezes back just as tightly.)

——————

There’s another television. He keeps ahold of Six when he walks towards it because he _can’t_ but he also can’t _not,_ and—

_[STATIC]_

It’s so BRIGHT—

_[STATIC]_

His head HURTS—

_[STATIC]_

[BROADCASTER-TOWER-CAGE-VESSEL-MONO]

[now] [what] [now] [i don’t—] [open the door] [i don’t—] [it’s time] [but it hurts] [open the door] [i don’t want to] [you have to] [i don’t want to] [you have to] [i know]

[TUNE]

[now] 

The screen collapses around his hand and warps around his fingers, pulling him in, dragging him, pushing him through and!towards the door. It’s so close. It’s so close. It twists and blinks and taunts and STARES. [don’t look at me don’t look at me]

The door opens easily. Too easily, easier than anything. Light spills out from behind it, fiery magenta, harsh and choking in its brilliance. 

There’s a man sitting in a chair silhouetted by the light. He’s long and tall and thin and formally-dressed with a hat on his head, and his face is shadowed. The light fades to gray and Six’s hand closes over his and she pulls him away, but his head HURTS ITHURTSITHURTS _ITHURTSITHURTS—_

The Thin Man is on the screen and Six is waving for him to move, she’s grabbing at his hand, she’s frantic, she wants to run Mono wants to run but he can’t he can’t MOVE he’s terrified it knows him he knows it he doesn’t know it at all and it HURTS. 

Hands press against the screen and the static collapses around them like water, and the Thin Man comes crawling through the screen.

[TRAITOR-SHADOW-HUNGER-CONSUME-HURT-HURT-HURT-HURT-SIX]

[w h e r e] [go away] [w h e r e] [leave us alone]

Six is gone and he only has a second to be glad for it before the Thin Man’s hands are reaching for him and he finally has the strength to runrunrunrunrun—

He slides under the bed and Six didn’t hide well enough she waited for him why did she wait for him she shouldn’t have waited for him she crawls towards him and she reaches for his hand and he reaches out with his and then the Thin Man reaches out with his and Six is gonegonegonegonegone how is she GONE—

[go home] [give her back] [go h—] [give her back give her back give her back] [don’t follow me] [you can’t stop me] [i can try]

A little glitching shadow-child in the shape of Six kneels on the floor. He can’t hear what she’s saying, and she vanishes when he gets close. 

(Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid.)

(Look what you’ve done.)

He rushes after the Thin Man but the Thin Man is long gone.

The TV’s still on, though. 

And if the TV is still on—

He presses his hands against the screen in a mockery of the Thin Man’s own movements and the static collapses and envelops him, sending him through the twisting blinking thing that won’t stop LOOKING and out, out, out, he shatters the screen as it spits him out but he can’t bring himself to feel sorry about it.

He goes forward. He has to find her. 

_(I’ll always come back for you, I promise.)_

_(Don’t lie to me.)_

——————

Forward, he has to go forward. All the twisted people are falling and he passes them by. The static consumes him and envelops him and spits him back out again and every time the blinking thing just STARES at him and his head pounds and aches in time with his heartbeat but he can’t stop. He can’t stop. 

The vacant twisted people with their hollow faces and sagging skin all run for him, claw at him, but that, at least, is familiar. They’ve always hated him. 

——————

And then the Thin Man has come for him, the Broadcaster, the Tower resplendent, the Transmission beaming through his flickering half-solid form, and all Mono can do is run. 

[face me] [i won’t]

He leaps onto a train car and runs for his life and the Thin Man doesn’t run, he walks, stalks, looms, just _is_ where he needs to be when he needs to be there. So Mono disconnects the train car and as it falls, the Thin Man stops and stares. 

(Mono knows he could come after him. But the Thin Man just stops and stares. Lets him fall.)

[face me] [i can’t]

The train car slams to a stop and Mono is thrown against the side. He feels something snap but the pain in his head is worse than anything in his ribs. 

He slumps to the ground. 

It takes him too long to stand and when he tries to straighten his ribs SCREAM at him, and he settles for hunching over awkwardly. He holds back a whimper of pain. He won’t make a sound. He won’t. 

A little shadow-Six glitches into _[STATIC]_ existence in front of him and she’s _[STATIC]_ he can’t hear her, she is _[STATIC]_ for him she is _[STATIC] [STATIC] [STATIC]_

He limps forward to follow her. It’s not really her, he knows it’s not, but he reaches for her hand anyway. She dissolves before he can touch her, and reappears farther away, beckoning him to follow. 

He does. 

——————

He climbs out of the underground into the pouring, flooding, freezing rain, pelting against his already-soaked and rattled frame. The Thin Man waits for him, and—

[face me] [please] [you must] [i can’t] [you must] [it hurts] [i know. i’m sorry]

—and Mono falls to his knees.

He wants to go home. 

(He has no home, his only home is Six and she is gone, the Man in front of him took her and she’s probably dead or dying or imprisoned somewhere awful and Mono is just sitting here kneeling in the rain, upset because he hurts. Get up. Get up. Get up.) 

He sighs, shuddering. And for the first time in a long, long time, he takes off his paper bag. He sets it down, and it floats down the flooded street, away from him. He won’t be getting it back. 

The Thin Man comes close, reaches a hand sparking with static and energy and—

[face me]

—and Mono gets up. 

[TRAITOR-SHADOW-HUNGER-CONSUME-HURT-HURT-HURT-HURT-SIX, the twisting blinking thing seethes.]

[that’s wrong]

[it’s not]

Mono raises his hand to match the Thin Man’s.

[it’s wrong]

[go home. please]

[i’m going to save her]

The Thin Man, crooked in his movements, attempts to reach for him again. Mono mimics the motion. 

[do you think she would do the same for you]

[yes]

[do you think she could do the same for you]

[yes]

[how do you know]

[she already has]

[how do you know]

The city twists, and Mono wrenches it back into shape. The Thin Man warps the buildings and the streets into crooked, drooping shapes and Mono straightens them. 

[she’s saved my life a hundred times already]

[to use you]

[she saved me because it’s what friends do]

[it’s what you do]

[i do because we’re friends and so does she]

[you don’t think she’s using you]

[of course not]

The streetlights brighten dangerously. 

[the girl who puts survival above all else]

[she’s not]

[do you really think you’re enough to make her change]

[i could be]

[you’re not]

With every burst of static and electricity the city ripples. 

[how do you know]

[i know]

[you don’t know anything]

With one final blast of sparking brilliance, the Thin Man unceremoniously falls to the ground. He desperately tries to stand on his shaky limbs, but he starts to dissolve into rainwater and static and as the lights go out, he collapses.

[i’m sorry]

[me too]

And then he’s just... gone. 

The Tower looms, and Mono drags it to him. The lightbulbs flicker as he straightens the city once more, manhandling it into its proper, untwisted shape. 

The Tower opens for him. 

[BROADCASTER-TOWER-CAGE-VESSEL-MONO]

[go away]

——————

The hallway is familiar but the rooms and doorways it opens into are not. Scattered toys and furniture float gently through the fire-lit air, like a dilapidated house flooded in magenta water. 

At first he wanders, lost in the doorways that lead nowhere and staircases that lead everywhere, but then he hears the song. A light, muffled, haunting-pretty-sad-familiar song, a song he knows from a basement and a music box and a girl humming under her breath, and, gasping, he sprints toward the sound. He rushes through the doorways and hallways and staircases, ignoring the floating detritus and hoping desperately to find something on the other side. 

He bursts through a door. The song is so loud it’s almost deafening. He comes to a stumbling stop, surrounded by toys and gaudy wallpaper and vivid vivid magenta, but all he can see is Six.

He knows it’s her. He doesn’t know how he knows he just—he knows. Despite the warped and lengthened limbs and painfully-twisted-up feet, he knows it’s her. 

“[What] did [it] do [to] you,” he reaches his hand towards her, and slowly lets it fall when she doesn’t take it. She slides her music box closer to her, backing away from him. 

“It’s [me],” he whispers, “it’s [okay] now, [it’ll] be [okay].” 

She doesn’t respond. He’s not sure if she can.

“Hey,” he says, like they do. She shuffles towards him, and... and there’s a hammer. 

He knows what he has to do. It’s the last thing he wants to do. She loves her song, her music box, he’s known that since they met. She loves it in this form too. 

She doesn’t seem upset in here. 

But is she happy? 

Is this what she’s been looking for? Safety and happiness in a magenta-fire-flooded room, twisted-up like the monsters they run from, but safe? 

Six doesn’t like being trapped. She was miserable in the Hunter’s cabin with only her music box for company, is this really any different? Is this really better?

It can’t be better. 

Mono takes a deep, shuddering breath, and slams the hammer into the music box. 

——————

_[STATIC]_

——————

He’s in a dark... somewhere. It’s empty and cold and it’s—

——————

_[STATIC]_

——————

She’s chasing him, clutching her battered music box close. She’s screaming and it sounds like her vocal chords are just as twisted as the rest of her, nothing like the soft, shy way she’d hum her song under her breath when it got too dark. Mono hates how much she is not herself, and hates even more that he has to run from her. 

——————

He bashes his way through another door and smashes another music box. Her discordant screams echo in his ears. 

——————

_[STATIC]_

——————

The only light in this place is the faint pale blue surrounding him, filtering down from the ceiling. It’s so cold. 

“HEY,” he calls for her. Who else is there to call for? “HEY” [HEY] “HEY” [HEY] “HEY—“

——————

He bashes through another door.

“Please, [Six], it’s [me],” he cries, but she only screams. 

He smashes her music box again. 

——————

He bashes through yet another door.

“[Listen] to [me],” he shouts, his voice growing hoarse. “HEY” [HEY] “HEY” [HEY—]

She swipes at him, still screaming, so he smashes her music box (again). 

——————

_[STATIC]_

——————

_[STATIC]_

It’s quiet it’s quiet it’s quiet there is only the pulsing of the flesh of the blinking thing and the music box weakly playing, so he—

_[STATIC]_

“HEY” [HEY] “HEY” [HEY] “HEY—“

—smashes it with the axe while she recoils from the sound of his voice, and he—

_[STATIC]_

—smashes it again, brutally ending the song—

_[STATIC]_

And it is wholly, unutterably quiet. 

And Six stands, whole and unbroken, as herself. 

And the twisted blinking thing RISES and there’s nothing to do but run. 

[BROADCASTER-TOWER-CAGE-VESSEL-MONO]

——————

Running is familiar. The pulsating flesh stares at him and he flinches away from its gaze [don’t look at me] [WE SEE YOU] and he reaches for Six’s hand, but he misses, and instead he follows close behind as the thing spills after them, crashing down like a wave. 

There’s a bridge, and the pale light of a screen on the other side, and Mono runs—

But Six has always been faster than him, and he’s always been clumsy, and—

[WE WILL HAVE YOU]

[let me go]

[YOU ARE OURS]

[let me go]

[YOU ARE OURS]

[i want to go home]

[YOU ARE HOME]

—and he trips, falls forward, and his aching ribs make themselves known as he struggles to his feet and runs after Six. She’s holding her hand out, she’s holding her hand out like she always does, and like he always does, he jumps—

_(“Thank you,” he says, and she shakes her head. “Tha—“ he starts, and she shushes him. “Hey,” she whispers, and waves for him to jump. “Clumsy,” she snorts, and he smiles sheepishly. Even in the rain, she easily catches him when he jumps to her.)_

—and she catches him, steady as always. He looks up at her, and he doesn’t know what to say this time— _thank you_ doesn’t feel like enough. 

She stares at him, and he can’t see her face, silhouetted against the bright light of the screen behind her. 

And

She 

Lets 

Go.

She lets go. 

She lets him go. 

She—

Why did—

How could she let him go?

Why did she let him go?

It doesn’t—

It doesn’t make any sense?

Why—

H—

How—

——————

He falls.

——————

He lands, and his breath is knocked out from his lungs. Choking and wheezing, he gets to his knees, and gags at the feeling of flesh beneath his hands, at eyes on him that won’t stop LOOKING—

——————

Where can he go?

——————

Where is he supposed to go?

——————

“STOP [looking] AT [me],” he screams. 

——————

Why did she let him fall? 

——————

Where is he supposed to go?

——————

There’s a chair on a pile of blinking, twisted flesh. There’s nowhere else for him to go.

——————

He curls into a ball, tucking his legs close to his chest and pressing his face into his knees. None of it makes any sense. Why did she let him go?

——————

The twisted thing forms into a dim, empty room around him, but he knows it is false. He knows its true face. 

——————

He doesn’t cry.

——————

[BROADCASTER-TOWER-CAGE-VESSEL-MONO]

[what do you want]

[TRAITOR-SHADOW-HUNGER-CONSUME-HURT-HURT-HURT-HURT-SIX]

[don’t talk about her like that]

[WHY]

[ ]

[SHE BETRAYED YOU]

[she could come back for me]

[SHE WILL NOT]

[she might regret it]

[EVEN YOU KNOW THAT IS FALSE]

[...fine]

[HURT]

[yes]

[F R E E U S]

[no]

[W H Y]

[i’m not stupid]

——————

[do you think i annoyed her]

[WHAT]

[maybe she didn’t actually like me]

[ ]

[maybe she thought i was stupid to hold hands and play games with her]

[YES]

[i just wanted to make her happy]

[YOU FAILED]

[i know]

[TRAITOR-SHADOW-HUNGER-CONSUME-HURT-HURT-HURT-HURT-SIX]

[i guess]

——————

[BROADCASTER-TOWER-CAGE-VESSEL-MONO]

[what]

[STOP SINGING]

[no]

——————

[maybe she was mad i broke her music box]

[YES]

[it was important to her]

[YES]

[i broke it]

[YES]

[i wanted to help]

[YOU CANNOT]

——————

[it hurts]

[HURT]

——————

[BROADCASTER-TOWER-CAGE-VESSEL-MONO]

[what]

[ALMOST TIME]

[for what]

[TRAITOR-SHADOW-HUNGER-CONSUME-HURT-HURT-HURT-HURT-SIX]

[i don’t think i want to see her again]

[STOP]

[what]

[STOP TRAITOR-SHADOW-HUNGER-CONSUME-HURT-HURT-HURT-HURT-SIX]

[how]

[F R E E]

[no]

[S O O N]

——————

[TUNE]

[not yet] 

——————

[TUNE]

[not yet]

——————

[TUNE]

[now]

**Author's Note:**

> did I go through an entire gameplay video multiple times to find every single time Six catches Mono for this? yes, yes I did


End file.
